Bittersweet Harvests

by Melanie Fire Salamander

editorial

The Goddess is calling in her harvest now, and with it one of the Craft's best-loved elders, Doreen Valiente. Most of us only met Doreen through her writing, but in her prose she was the best and most trustworthy of guides, wide-ranging yet always deeply and organically connected to her pagan British roots. We'll miss her.

As Death is an autumn aspect of the Goddess, so too is the Mistress of Beasts. Two articles this issue study and play with this avatar -- one providing an exercise so you too can discover your beastly nature. The Goddess is a mistress of vegetable life as well; in time for the grape harvest, we present a second half to last issue's sacred marriage story, covering sacred marriages of the vine-god Dionysos and other Roman deities.

Our sheaves stacked, our grapes pressed, we have time to look to the heavens. We give you an equinox horoscope and an essay meditating on the meaning of August's total solar eclipse.

The time of the light is past, and darkness is upon us. The Lady waits for us, staring forward with great, golden cat eyes.

Copyright © 2006 by the article's author

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